A great variety of dried food products are prepared with starch. Advantageously, dried food stuffs can be stored for extended periods of time without deterioration. Food stuffs can thus be dried for purposes of preservation; or for purposes of convenience, as with food stuffs which are intermediates needed for the preparation of other commercially distributed foods.
Known methods for preparing dried food products include U.S. Pat. No. 3,940,505 to National Starch and Chemical Corporation which describes a process for the drum drying of such diverse fruits and vegetables as: Beets, peppers, carrots, tomatos, lemons, limes, blueberries, strawberries, cranberries, apples, onions, pineapples, bananas, meats, cheeses, garlic and shallots. In accordance with the process described in this patent, dried food stuffs can be prepared by blending the food material in a comminuted form with starch and then drum drying. This process calls for the addition of water, if necessary.
Problems are encountered however, if the above described drum drying method is used with food materials having a high fat content. In fact, U.S. Pat. No. 4,232,052, also to National Starch and Chemical Corporation, specifically sights the above indicated patent (U.S. Pat. No. 3,940,505) and discusses the problems encountered with food stuffs having a high fat content. In accordance with this teaching, when the drum drying procedure is used with foods having a high fat content such as almonds and peanuts, a pasty consistency develops rather than the desired powdered state. Accordingly, U.S. Pat. No. 4,232,052 avoided such difficulties encountered with the earlier process by first forming a solution of a film forming starch, dextrin, or gum, and then spray drying this solution in the presence of latent gas to form a grinding agent. This grinding agent is then added in a dry form to the high fat food stuff in an amount of from 25 to 400% by weight of the fat content in order to achieve powdering.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,232,052 indicates previous methods used to prepare dry, powdered high fat food products include: making a paste or emulsion of the food followed by spray drying with an inert carrier. One disadvantage, however, of the spray drying technique mentioned above is that frequently fat and other components separate when a high fat food product is spray dried.
It has now been discovered that drum or extrusion dried food stuffs can be prepared from nutmeats; which are a food material having high fat content. Furthermore, this can be achieved without encountering the aforementioned pasting problems and without using the previously indicated dried grinding agents. Drum or extrusion drying can also be used while simultaneously maintaining the homogeneous consistancy of the food product. Accordingly, it is an object of the instant invention to provide for a drum or extrusion dried nutmeat and starch food product. It is a further object of the instant invention to provide a method for the drum or extrusion drying of a homogeneous food product made from high fat content nutmeats. Other objects will become apparent as this description proceeds.